Dear Ex-Husband,

Honestly, there is no need to thank me, it was my pleasure to raise the child we created together without your help.

It was my pleasure to know that on the day he was born, you felt comfortable enough with his well being to be able to go party with your buddies.  It gave me a warm fuzzy feeling when you did not call and check on us, because that meant you knew we were in safe hands and were doing okay.  That pesky, little complication I had after he was born really was no big deal.

It was totally okay that my father had to call your commanding officer to remind you to send me and the baby some money.  After all, I know how difficult it had to be to remember you had a family when you were forced to hang out with drinking buddies for most of your free time.

It really was my pleasure to have my parents come up with the idea of flying you out to see the baby when he was two weeks old.  I know how hard it had to of been for you to come up with that idea on your own, after all you were in another state. What I thought really rocked was when I paid for plane tickets for myself and a six month old baby to fly to San Diego to see you and because I found some inappropriate – at least what I thought was inappropriate – pictures of you and some “lady” I ended up spending most of my time alone.  It was awesome training for my future.

It was awesome when I found out that my parents were moving to another country and as a result I was losing my place to live.  The only place the baby had ever lived. What made that experience even more awesome was the fact that you seemed to have enough confidence in my abilities to truly be on my own that you did not feel as if I needed any help during that transition time.

I really appreciate the fact that after you received your Administrative Discharge from the military, you did not send us any more money, even though we were still married.  It showed me how capable you thought I was at being able to make ends meet on my low salary.  One of my favorite things is how you constantly gave me hope about how you really cared about the child.  You told me so many times about the gifts and cards you had bought to send him.  It is unfortunate that the U.S. Mail was out to get you, and never allowed a single one of those items to arrive.

It was my pleasure to send you pictures of the rapidly growing child, I never needed to be thanked for that – obviously you knew that since you never did.  It was my pleasure to offer you a place to stay – many times – if you ever chose to come and visit the boy.  It did me a world of good to ask you to help pay for surgery for the little man’s ears – to save his hearing – and hear you say you could not afford to help me with that.  It allowed me to create a debt that has taken me years to pay off.

It has become a source joy to know that with all of those years of not making you appear like a dead beat bio-dad, you now have the opportunity to re-create your past with the young man you chose to not get to know.  My heart is filled to the brim with the wonderful way you have manage to portray yourself.  It is nice to know that now that he has reached adulthood, and you can no longer be held financially responsible for him, you are telling him such wonderful “fairy tales”.  So far my favorite is “Your Mom Left Me Because She Could Not Handle Military Life”.  That one is so much better than my version of the same tale “Help! Bio-Dad Leaves Pregnant Wife With No Money And No Place To Live”.  Your title has a much catchier sound to it.

Your insistence of taking such a hands off approach in my son’s life has turned out to be a good thing.  Instead of a young man having to watch the father figure in his life go to prison, he got to have a dad who feels honored to have been a part of his life.  He got to have a dad who loved him so much that he adopted him.  He got to have a dad that literally carried him on his back, so that the boy with a broken femur could get in and out of the woods when he wanted to go hunting.  He got to have a dad who is and was imperfect, who has made parenting mistakes, who cannot create a fairy tale life with him, but a dad who would gladly and without hesitation lay down his life for him.

Thank YOU, it HAS been my pleasure.

Melissa